


Until We Meet Again

by Dark_rune



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-19
Updated: 2020-06-19
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:27:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24797650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dark_rune/pseuds/Dark_rune
Summary: Dean has been dead for six months.  Sam has a conversation with Death in a bar about it.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 2
Kudos: 23





	Until We Meet Again

**Author's Note:**

> A quick one off that I thought about the other day at work. Kind of sad and happy all at once.
> 
> Edit: I changed some of the last sentences. I think it works better, or at least I'm happier with it. *shrugs*

Sam stared down into his beer. Dean had been dead for months now. Deep down he had always known that hunters did not end well. The only ones who came even close to happy endings were the ones that got out. But some how he had convinced himself that he and Dean would be fine. Always on top. 

It had happened fast. Dean was alive one moment and the next the demon had driven a knife into his neck. There had been no slow-motion slumping to the ground. Just the dull thud of Dean’s body sliding to the earth. Sam remembered a great many details in that moment. 

The demon’s pained cry had been loud. Louder than his own. In the past he had seen Cas smite. Seen the righteous wrath of the angel directed toward some foe that had harmed him or Dean before. Sam had never seen anything vaporized before. The demon was briefly outlined in a flash of light and then all that was left was the knife it had been holding. There hadn’t even been any ash as the knife clattered to the ground.

Sam remembered trying to move toward Dean but feeling like he was paralyzed. The shock kept him rooted to the spot. He watched as Cas fell to his knees and pulled Dean’s head into his lap. Sam didn’t heard what the angel whispered to Dean, but he heard the whispered ‘no’. He heard the angel’s wail of anguish. The memory of that sound woke Sam more often than his own grief. 

Cas had gently laid Dean down and scooped up the knife the demon had dropped. “I’m sorry Sam,” he had said. “I can’t stay. I have to go back to him.”  
And then Cas was gone. Sam hadn’t heard from him since that moment. He’d lost his brother and his friend in the same instant.

A gentle clinking of a glass being set down pulled Sam from his thoughts. He looked up to see a woman slide into the booth across from him. He frowned.

“What do you want Billie?”

“Mixing business and pleasure with a sense of duty,” she told him. 

“So you’re here to gloat,” Sam snapped. “You finally got one of the Winchesters.”

“Gloating isn’t something I do,” Billie said. “The pleasure is that I get to have one of Maurice’s Old Fashions and he makes the best ones I’ve ever had. The business is, unfortunately, also Maurice. He’s about to suffer a massive stroke. The duty is to tell you that you need to mourn your brother.” She took a sip of her drink and set it back down. “Death is natural, but it is hard. I know how hard it is. You need to grieve for your brother. He’s not coming back.”

Sam snorted. “Except that he’s done it before. Lots of times. It’s just a matter of waiting for it to happen.”

A look of sadness crossed over her face. “Oh, Sam. Dean isn’t coming back. He can’t. He’s gone. It’s not that I won’t let his soul cross back to the realm of the living. His soul is gone. The blade that killed him destroyed his soul. I didn’t collect it when he died because there was nothing to collect. I’m sorry, but your brother really is gone.”

“No,” Sam told her. “Cas will find a way to bring him back. He’s gone to find a way for Dean to come back.”

Billie leaned back and sipped on her drink for a moment. “If I were to take you to my office right now you would find a cursed object. You’d probably see it as an hourglass or some other time keeping device. My predecessor found it. Or possibly his predecessor. It’s been there for as long as I can remember. I never knew what it did until I became Death.”

“What does your office decorations have to do with Dean.”

“I guess you could say it allows for time travel. In a limited way.” Billie finished her drink and set the empty glass aside. “Castiel brought me the blade that killed your brother. Death has been looking for it for a long time. It shouldn’t exist. It can’t be destroyed, but it can be hidden. He brought me the blade and I immediately went to secret it way. When I returned your angel was gone and the hourglass had been activated.”

“That just proves my point,” Sam smirked. “He’s gone to find a way to save Dean.”

Billie shook her head and continued in the calm way she always did. “Limited time travel Sam. It’s a cursed item, they always have a catch. The hourglass will send you back to the moment of your birth and you can live forward from that moment. You know everything you knew when you went back, but you can’t change anything. Trying to change anything and the hourglass destroys you. Castiel has gone back in time, but he can’t stop your brother’s death. And he knows it.”

Sam shook his head. “That doesn’t make any sense. Why would he do that?”

“How long have you known Castiel,” Billie asked. She flagged down a waiter and asked for another drink for herself and one for Sam. 

“About ten years.”

“And after ten years what would Castiel do for you if you asked?”

“Almost anything,” Sam said. “Especially the last few years.”

Billie nodded. “And what would he have done for Dean.”

“Anything at all. Everything I guess.”

“Why would he do that,” Billie mused as she accepted the glass from the waiter. “Why would an angel of heaven dive into hell to pull a mere mortal from torment? Fall from heaven willingly? To stand along side that mortal against all comers, even his own angelic brethren? What could possibly motivate such acts?”

“Cas loved Dean like a brother,” Sam said.

“And here I thought you were supposed to be the smart Winchester brother.” 

“Fine.” Sam raked his hands through his hair and swallowed half his beer. “Cas loved Dean more than that. Differently.”

“He was in love with Dean,” Billie provided. “He would have done anything for that man and the thought of being separated from Dean was too much to bear.”

“Why go back to then? Cas is billions of years old. He’d be just as far away from Dean.”

“You’re smarter than this Sam,” Billie sighed. “I’ll assume it’s the beer muddling your brain. Death creates a divide in your life. On one side you have your loved one and on the other you have the rest of your life without that person. Castiel had a choice. Stay on this side of that divide and live for eternity without Dean. Or go back and live on the other side with the knowledge that one day he would be able to get to be with Dean again.”

“But he can’t save Dean. He’s still going to lose him.”

“True. But for all those years, eons upon eons, Castiel knows that he has Dean to look forward to. What is a few billion years when you get your love at the end of it all?”

“You’re telling me that Cas has gone back to relive all of existence to spend ten more years with my brother?”

Billie raised her glass and tipped it toward Sam. “Knew you would get there eventually.”

Sam stared down into his glass. “I knew that Cas loved Dean, but I didn’t know that he’d loved him enough to relive his life twice just to be with him.”

“Oh Sam,” Billie laughed. “So close. Ever so close.”

A commotion near the bar caught Sam’s attention. The bartender was missing and the waiter that had served them their drinks was yelling for someone to call an ambulance.

“Duty calls.” Billie set the glass on the table and shifted out of the booth. 

Sam reached out and grabbed her arm. “What do you mean I’m ‘ so close’.”

Billie smiled gently. “Death sees things differently than most beings do, mortal or otherwise. This isn’t the first time that Castiel has given me that blade. And it won't be the last.”

Sam slowly pulled his hand back. "How many times?"

"You couldn't comprehend the number even if I told you," Billie said. "I'm pretty sure humanity doesn't even have a name for it. You could count all the stars in the heavens and not even come close."


End file.
